Azure Weekly: Dec 26, 2016

Are you having difficulty keeping up to date on all the frequent changes and updates in the Microsoft Azure space? Then the Build Azure Weekly has the solution you’re looking for. Build Azure Weekly is a weekly blog post that includes all the latest Microsoft Azure Service Updates from the week in addition to links to many other blog articles, podcasts and videos from all over the Internet.

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Service Updates

Here’s a list of the Microsoft Azure Service Updates from over the past week:

I am excited to have Datadog as the sponsor of Build Azure! Instead of displaying crummy banner ads that no one likes, we’re able to have a sponsorship from a company with a product everyone using Microsoft Azure should look at.

Featured Product

Microsoft and SparkFun have teamed up to bring you some IoT (Internet of Things) fun. The Microsoft Azure IoT Starter Kit for the SparkFun Thing Development Board has been designed to help you seamlessly connect your device to the cloud with Microsoft Azure IoT. This kit includes an ‘Azure certified for IoT’ SparkFun Thing Dev Board, and a breadboard and wires to help you set up your circuits. There are also a variety of sensors such as a photoresistor to sense light as well as a humidity/temperature sensor to read the ambient temperature and humidity in a room (or outdoors with some weatherproofing). Once your board is connected to Microsoft Azure you can start visualizing and analyzing your data.

Microsoft Azure is a leading provider of cloud computing and Microsoft Azure IoT Hub enables secure, reliable bi-directional communications between IoT endpoints such as sensors and the cloud. Azure IoT Hub supports a broad set of operating systems (Linux, Windows, RTOS etc.), protocols and common languages, so you can configure your connections to the devices.

The SparkFun Thing Dev Board is based on the popular ESP8266 WiFi module. With it you have a simple microcontroller with built in WiFi to interface with your sensors, buttons, and LEDs that can be controlled from or post data to the web. Everything you need to get started from voltage regulation to a PCB antenna are built into the board. Just plug a USB cable into the board and you can actually start programming in the Arduino IDE or other environments.

Feedback

Doe you have any suggestions or general feedback on the Build Azure Weekly blog series? Please contact me and send it on over! Or tweet it over to @BuildAzure.

The types of feedback I’m looking for are:

What do you like?

What do you dislike?

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Please feel free to reach out and let me know your feedback on the Build Azure Weekly series. I post this weekly post as a service to others and really want to make it the best it can be.

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Posted by Chris Pietschmann

Chris is a 6-time Microsoft MVP and has nearly 20 years of experience building enterprise systems both in the cloud and on-premises. He is also a Certified Microsoft Azure Solutions Architect (both MCSD and MCSE), a Microsoft Certified Trainer, and self proclaimed Cloud Advocate. He has a passion for technology and sharing what he learns with others to help enable them to learn faster and be more productive.